“A Twenty-First-Century Catastrophe” - The Ripple Effect: The Fate of Freshwater in the Twenty-First Century - page 176

feet above flood stage, causing rampant flooding. More than four thousand homes lost
power; over a hundred people were evacuated to shelters; parts of I-95, the major East
Coast artery, were flooded; Amtrak service was suspended; sewage treatment plants
failed; and President Obama declared a state of emergency. New Englanders were be-
wildered. “Nobody was prepared,” said a college student. “When it comes to man versus
nature, nature wins every time.”
As in Australia, years of water scarcity in Atlanta, Georgia, masked the threat of sud-
denly having too much.
PRAYING FOR RAIN
With over 5.4 million residents, the Atlanta metropolitan area was the fastest-growing,
most populous region in the Southeast in 2007, and the city promoted itself as being
“the economic engine of the South.” But as Atlanta grew rapidly—starting in the mid-
seventies, with the city's rise accelerated by its hosting of the 1996 Olympic Games,
which led to a construction boom—city and state leaders failed to create comprehensive
water policies or invest in water infrastructure.
The spring and summer of 2007 were virtually rainless, and Atlanta's main reservoir,
Lake Sidney Lanier, dropped a record fifteen feet. Frontpage photographs across the
nation showed docks high and dry and boats stranded on the lake's gravel ledges. In
April, Georgia was placed under statewide restrictions that limited outdoor watering to
three days a week. In May, Atlanta allowed watering only on the weekends. In August,
temperatures reached 104 degrees, one degree below Atlanta's record, set in 1980. In
September, officials banned all outdoor watering in the northern half of the state for
the first time in history. In October, Atlanta officials asserted that Lake Lanier was less
than three months from turning empty, while smaller reservoirs were dropping even
faster. In November, Georgia governor Sonny Perdue declared a state of emergency for
the northern third of his state, asked President George W. Bush to label it a major dis-
aster area, and cut public utilities' water withdrawals by 10 percent. Then Perdue joined
hands with supporters on the statehouse steps to pray for rain.
To some, the calamity was no surprise. Years of pro-growth policies and lax zoning
had led to poor water management and urban sprawl; hydrologists had warned Georgia
for nearly two decades that such a drought was possible, but legislators had never de-
veloped a coherent response. In the 1990s, plans to build a network of state reservoirs
were defeated, largely by developers who were angered that they would not be allowed
to build homes around the new lakes. A 2003 plan to sell water permits, which would
limit water use, was derailed by Georgians who feared that neighboring states would